Young offenders will be taught how to spray graffiti behind bars as part of a £300,000 arts project.

In a move attacked as "state-sponsored vandalism", leading graffiti artist Elph is to teach his skills to inmates in Polmont Young Offenders Institution.

The project is part of the Scottish Arts Council Inspiring Change scheme to take music, drama and visual arts into prisons.

The SAC are set to confirm the £300,000 funding this week.

But the scheme drew criticism from Labour MSP Duncan McNeil, whose Greenock constituency has suffered badly from graffiti vandalism for many years.

He said: "Graffiti is no small matter when it is being carried out on your property or in your neighbourhood and people will be astounded it is being taught in our prisons.

"Convicted prisoners would be better served facing up to their victims and the consequences of their actions rather than having taxpayers' money wasted on them with soft-touch schemes like this.

"If the government believe state-sponsored vandalism will get young offenders back on track, the writing is on the wall for them."

Tory justice spokesman Bill Aitken said: "To have a graffiti artist in Polmont, where many inmates will have committed acts of vandalism by putting graffiti on walls and street furniture, is not a good idea."

Edinburgh's Elph, 31, is the city's best-known"street artist".

He said: "There's a lot worse things you can learn in prison than doing graffiti.".

And Jackie Laird, who has led community projects in Edinburgh's Oxgangs for many years, said: "If this helps channel young people away from pointless vandalism into something more worthwhile, I think it could work."

Elph's workshops are part of a five-prison project in which 80 offenders will be encouraged to produce artworks that reflect their feelings about themselves.

As well as the graffiti project, Glasgow's Citizens Theatre will work with 35 women inmates in HMP Greenock and Scottish Opera will work with 20 long-term prisoners in Shotts.